WMT Disappoints…Look For This Name After The Close
Stocks today
are down after a strong finish yesterday. Giant
retailer Wal-Mart
(
WMT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) missed third-quarter earnings by a penny. The
company’s arnings rose to $2 billion on quarterly sales of $62 billion. Weekly
jobless claims rose by 13,000 to 366K while the US trading deficit rose to $41.3
billion. The White House Council of Economic Advisers noted that the deficit is
a concern and it hopes to cut it in half over the next five years. Gold prices
rose to a 7-year high at the $398.00 mark. Home prices also rose at least 10%
from a year ago in 41 of the 124 areas, with Southern California leading the way
at >25%. After the close, look for Dell Computer
(
DELL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) to report; analysts are looking for .21/share.
The Dow Jones Industrial
Average
(
$INDU.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) is down -0.31% at 9817.64. The S&P 500
(
$SPX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
is down -0.21% at 1055.21. The Nasdaq
(
$COMPQ |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) is down -0.48% at
1963.20.
The day’s leading sectors are
Pharmaceutical Index
(
$DRG.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), 2.31%, S&P Healthcare
(
$HCX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
+2.29%, Morgan Stanley Hlth Care
(
$HMO.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), +1.90%, Oil Service
Sector Index
(
$OSX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), +1.27%. and Biotech Index
(
$BTK.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
+1.29%.
Weak today are GSTI
Semiconductor [GSM.X|GSM.X]
-1.16%, Semiconductor Sector Index
(
$SOX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
-1.13% and Computer Tech Index
(
$XCI.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), -1.05%.
Economic news releases for
today included export prices that showed a 0.1% increase, while import prices
dropped 0.1%. Initial claims rose to 366K. The US Trade deficit balance also
rose to $41.3 billion.
10-year Notes are +190
at 112 035.
The dollar
is -.64 at 91.78.
Gold is +0.07 at 395.70.
Crude Oil is -0.17 at
31.16.
Volume is 506,000,000 on
the NYSE, and 951,000,000 on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth is negative,
with NYSE issues declining over advancing issues by 1.14 and down over volume up
by 1.31; Nasdaq issues declining over advancing issues at 1.31, and down volume
over up volume at 1.29.
Top Dow stocks are:
Merck
(
MRK |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
+3.43% at 45.77, Boeing [BA|BA],
+2.01% at 39.82, Johnson and Johnson [JNJ|JNJ],
+1.9% at 50.91, and Alcoa
(
AA |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), +.73% at 32.92
Stocks in the news:
Officemax
(
OMX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
reported a 46% increase in net income on $1.29 billion of sales. Net income came
in at $24.1 million, beating Wall Street expectations. OMX is trading at its
52-week high of $9.
LSI logic
(
LSI |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) is
trading higher after announcing plans to spin off its storage
systems unit. The company’s board of directors has approved the spin-off and
expects an IPO in the first half of 2004.
Clothing retailer
Urban Outfitters‘
(
URBN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) third-quarter net rose
by 76% on $142.3 million of sales. It expanded the number of stores by 23% and
same-store sales increased by 17%.
Applied
Materials
(
AMAT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported fourth-quarter net profits of $15 million on
revenues of $1.22 billion. For the fiscal year, it lost $149 million on $4.32
billion of sales.
If you have any comments or questions, please
feel free to email me.
bricew@tradingmarkets.com